Ford CEO Calls Trump: “We are staying in America”

In what could be a great first victory for Trump and his desire to keep American companies from bailing out and heading south to Mexico, Bloomberg reports that Bill Ford, Chairman of Ford Motor company, personally called President elect Donald Trump to let Trump know that Ford will be keeping their Kentucky plant alive and will not be going to Mexico.

Ford builds the Lincoln MKC, a small SUV, as well as the Ford Escape, at the Louisville, Kentucky plant.

According to Christin Baker, a Ford spokesman, “We had planned to move the Lincoln MKC out of Louisville Assembly plant, probably to Cuautitlan factory in Mexico.”

Ford was one of a multitude of companies Trump had attacked and criticized for moving their plants out of America and down to Mexico.

Trump tweeted this out last night.

Just got a call from my friend Bill Ford, Chairman of Ford, who advised me that he will be keeping the Lincoln plant in Kentucky – no Mexico

According to the Bloomberg report, the U.S. automaker emailed out a statement saying, “We are encouraged that President-elect Trump and the new Congress will pursue policies that will improve U.S. competitiveness and make it possible to keep production of this vehicle here in the U.S.”

Bill Ford had met with Trump sometime during Trump’s presidential campaign but was unable to convince Trump to stop targeting the automaker. Ford stated that his company created 28,000 jobs in the U.S. over the last five years. Bill Ford reiterated this at a press conference in September when told reporters, “We are everything that he (Trump) should be celebrating about this country.”

Trump had brought up Ford Motor company as an example of one of many that Trump felt were taking away U.S. jobs by closing their plants here in America and moving them down to Mexico where the average employee wage is eighty percent less than their American counterparts. Trump threatened to hit all companies considering a move out of this country, with a thirty five percent tariff when they wanted to sell them back in America.

Trump is also determined to eradicate the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, which lets goods flow tariff free.